The weather4d app for iPhone is great, it features route planning as well as grib and also has a real time satelite tracking feature that allows you to pick the best time for connecting. For PC I prefer zygrib for the viewer

"I sent an email to my dealer to clear the situation; if the unlimited data is only for the data transfers via Iridium GO application or not."

Did you hear back from them?
I've also emailed and got a reply but it was quite confusing. It did sound like the Data can be used for anything though, just that the GO apps are optimised for Low data- which I guess the other apps would be as well.

I'm surprised one of the GO apps isn't a weather app? Must be a key thing people want them for.

I need to order soon so this is getting quite pressing for me. I don't want to blow $1500 on something that can't download Grib files.

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Im still researching and checked "Free Incoming Calls". Typically the caller would pay $1 plus change/min to make the call to the Iridium. However, can call you for free by calling Iridium's ground station in Arizona (which may incur long-distance charges for you if you don't have free long-distance and/or are not located in Tempe, AZ). When you call this number, you will be asked to enter in the satellite phone number for yoursel. The caller will then be connected to you for free.

Does anyone have experience with this? Does it work? Does the AZ number become busy or do the have enough lines to provide the service?

Almost all data over the web is compressed as much as it possibly can be... trust me, if the providers could compress it any more they would. I'm in the business consulting on this exact matter to AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint.

There are exceptions in the the way pages are served that google invented which dramatically lowers the amount of talkiness of the web pages by essentially steaming the web page to the destination. One call results in an entire web page being served rather than the back and forth communication of the early web. Most web apps are not yet using this new technology but it will get wide adoption in the next two years. It will basically make everyones current bandwidth appear to be about 10X that.

Anyhow, data is data and regardless of the size of the page being served, you are definitely bandwidth limited on satellite. As I stated in a previous post, I can see no reason how anyone would benefit from unlimited data as you are not going to be connected 24/7 to take advantage of that data.

The appropriate approach is to take a survey, similar to how to survey your power utilization to determine how much solar you need, and determine how much data you are likely to need in any given month. I am betting this is FAR less than Unlimited and you could probably end up paying less than half of the "unlimited" fee.

We haven't been that impressed with our Iridium sat phone yet (2 years) to contemplate buying another Iridium toy. We told the Ocens people at the boat show">Annapolis boat show yesterday that we have no confidence in the phone since we have yet to complete a call without being dropped and that about 20% of the time we have no service. Just our experience YMMV.

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